January 22, 2010 - Students of the Greater New Bedford Voc-Tech High School joined the Bristol County Sheriff's Office to provide IRIS scanning services to the residents of the Fairhaven Senior Center.

The program is designed to help authorities identify children or adults if they are lost or missing by using high-resolution images of the individual's eyes. The simple process only requires the resident to sit in a chair and look into a high definition camera that looks like a set of binoculars. The Bristol County Sheriff's Department then uploads the digital images into a national database, which will be used by police for future reference.

Sheriff Hodgson met with the seniors to explain the IRIS scanning process, and its ability to help track missing persons:

"Having your iris identity in our national database will allow the local police to match up your iris if you are missing. It is critically important that we are able to find out who you are, and get you back to your loved ones safely in an expeditious way."

The Voc-Tech students have worked with Deputy Linda Pacheco from the Bristol County Sheriff's Office on several occasions to assist with the scanning and data input of children and elderly in our area.